This invention relates to lawn mowers and more particularly to a spindle assembly for rotatably supporting the cutter blade of a rotary-type lawn mower.
In rotary-type lawn mowers, spindle assemblies are commonly used to rotatably support the cutter blade and couple the same to the engine. Prior art spindle assemblies typically include a spindle rotatably supported by bearings in a housing mounted on a cutter deck. The bearings are normally lubricated by grease. A pulley mounted on the spindle above the housing is coupled to the mower engine by a belt and pulley assembly. The cutter blade is fixed to the lower end of the spindle and below the cutter deck.
Spindle assemblies are normally exposed to an abusive environment of abrasive and corrosive materials, such as dirt, debris, sand and water. This is normally not a significant problem for residential-type lawn mowers which are designed to last a few hundred hours, which is typical for homeowner application with an expected life of five to seven years. While commercial lawn mowers are also expected to have a useful life of five to seven years, they are used from 600 to 1,000 hours per year, for a total life of 5,000 to 10,000 hours. As a result, frequent maintenance is required for spindle assemblies of prior art commercial-type lawn mowers. For example, to maintain cleanliness in the spindle assemblies, operators are required to grease the internal components anywhere from daily to at least once a week. Even with such short maintenance cycles, frequent repair is commonly required for prior art spindle assemblies used in commercial lawn mower applications.